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I'm a big fan of the philosophical and religious discussions on this channel.
We really are fighting a new form of gnosticism in the form of transhumanism. We are promised immortality, and instead, we receive slavery. Cyberpunk inadvertently points to the false promise and its fruits.
Great video David, I always love your discussions like this on your channel. Keep up the great work.
Love your video and thanks for opening about the topic.
I like how you note that playing as a character in a game is a gnostic "experience". Your definition of Gnosticism in general is well served by your comparison to the Christian one. Personally I lean towards the gnostic view of things, and I have studied some of the stuff from these esoteric schools of thought. I do not agree with all of their ideas, but I still find them interesting.
The most interesting gnostic book I have read is the Kybalion, its quite good. As a philosophy book rather than a religious one, I like what it contains.
A you, vs a compromised, mutilated body and mind you, is still you. Even if your actions may come from a violated or unstable state.
Speaking as someone with a family member suffering dementia.
Other thing I liked a lot in this game is Johnny's character arc from being a narcissist to realizing Arasaka was after Alt not him and that all his fight barely dented Arasaka's profits and power, humbling experience followed by a redemption helping V
Your commentary on occult themes is part of the reason I subscribed to the channel. You have a conversational and natural flow that is very nice to listen to without all of the lofty pretension that usually comes with the subject.
This video is a bit of synchronicity, I was actually thinking about the relationship of the body and soul this morning.
The notion that the body is a part of the soul really plays into the phenomenon of 'phantom limb' for people who lose parts of their body.
The most strange thing they displayed in their view of future is illogical that everyone will cut off natural hands into installing prosthesis ones. And in this game all people of city cut their hands. I'm still puzzling who made this idea, even by simple rational logic if so many people will remove so many body parts (not taking the pain and medical complications of such, ghosting pain of removed hands) it will make just huge biowaste problem at least. I'm not sure future people will use biowaste for food purposes.
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How can you recognize that humans are equal parts body and mind but also say that your mind without your body is a mockery but your body without your mind "is still you" ?
Why do you put the body over the mind? Are they co-dependent or aren't they?
I'm of the position that there is no one "Gnostic" position; it's a category foisted upon heterodox-thinking mystics by the orthodoxy priesthood for political control reasons. I'd say if there's one position shared by all of the various things and interpretations of myths that're called "Gnosticism", it's that, rather than Faith or Works, the true path to salvation, so to speak, is attaining INDIVIDUAL knowledge of God (in the philosophical sense). I don't see why you can't say all three of those things are significant and interrelated. All of those other strawmen about the sex of souls or androgyny or how the world is unbearably evil are just slander. Looking at it from a perennialist position, I also don't really see this sort of Hermetic Neo-Platonism, as in some fundamental way, incompatible with Christianity, (or at least my understanding of it).
I very much like your Gnostic interpretations, here. Let me suggest an extra twist: instead of just normal human body/identity vs engram identity, what if we add a mystical/spiritual element that is "real" (in some universe/story). So instead of just wondering whether the mind can live on as a bunch of 1s and 0s, what if there is also a "real" soul that is not necessarily attached to a particular body? Would the conclusion be that there is a real (mystical/religious) soul and a fake (engram) soul? Or would it be that both souls are "fake" without a body? And so on.
Feel free to steal this idea for a book/story, though I suspect it's been done before, e.g., in a Shadowrun-style setting where both magic and technology vie for power.
Cool primer on Gnosticism, in your opinion then, are our elites gnostics or satanists?
The Bible teaches that the body is most certainly a part of your being. The problem for man is that the body has been corrupted, and as a result of that so has the mind (soul). That is why it says in the Bible that Jesus Christ has performed a circumcision on every born again child of God. A circumcision of the spiritual self from the corrupted body until that body can be regenerated at the rapture, regardless of living or dead. That is the reason for being born again of the Spirit of God, so that the soul is regenerated and no longer corrupt, but it is still attached to the corrupt body. In conclusion, to be saved a man (or woman) needs to be born again of the Spirit of God to regenerate the soul, Jesus Christ performs a circumcision to separate the regenerated soul from the corrupt body for the time being, then at the rapture the regenerated soul is reunited with a brand new glorified body and that individual is now acceptable (in Christ) to enter Heaven. That is the "Cliffsnotes" version of my faith as it concerns the body, soul, and spirit of man.
I really do not think I have seen anyone review this game with such thought as you have.
Wonderful discussion on the game and Gnostic concepts. Never really thought about the conclusion you had, but that makes the most sense. Johnny is long dead, all that's left are the memories stored on the chip, and V's imagination of Johnny.
I think the soul and body are separate but the merger make us who we are. I, currently, was not the same person as a child, teenager etc. Teenage me is not really 'who I am' since that clash is over and that person is just a memory. Someone could take a moment clash and make a new person but it like memories of my past self; are not me currently. I'm the moment my soul and body meets in present time.
That's an interesting point on perspective and really makes you think on how all of the endings are in 3rd person meaning no matter what you're not V anymore.
I would also point out that Poland is a rather Catholic country and even if not all the devs practice the ideology would still be there
the thing about the game is that it kinda doesn't leave the interpretation to the player, because of the first person perspective. This game is kinda babies first gnostic adventure, the real deal is SOMA, if we are not just some storable data that can be copied in a chip, then it'd make no sense to change perspectives, because that implies that consciousness is generated by matter, and so you can be "revived", but if it's not then that should never happen in the game.
Hope we'll get to see you on the Superversive livestream in the future, I was really excited for that last week, but it sounds like something came up.
I never played the game, but all the videos of the horrendous glitches it had on release was hilarious.
Like you said, I like the fact that the game doesn't just automatically go in the transhumanist ("You're just your mind/conciousness, no matter the body we put you in.") path, but instead tries to do something different, saying something about how the person is mind and body together. CDPR are Polish, a country of Catholics, and probably considerably more religious than your average Anglo tech worker, especially when compared to Anglo game devs from California.
Great video, really enjoyed your thoughts on it!
When God made man, He made the body from dust and breathed the breath of life into him. Thus man became a living soul. Therefore it's my belief that I am a soul and that I'm composed of at least two parts – body and spirit. I think that "soul" and "spirit" are terms that are incorrectly used interchangeably.
The mind could also be abstracted away from the body. I am not my thoughts. Because I think to do something doesn't mean that I did that something. It also takes intent and a plan for that thought to truly become an action. It becomes absorbed into your being and becomes a thing you want to do. Even if you don't get to do it, you wanted to and that actually counts. But the thought alone is not enough to count for anything.
If the mind is abstracted away from the body, I am now composed of three parts – mind, body and spirit – the sum of which creates a living soul. Like I am three parts, so is God. I believe God presents Himself in three forms to represent this idea. The Father is the mind, the Son is the body, and the Holy Ghost is the spirit.
Or I could be completely wrong.
YES! I was hoping for another video on this topic!
I do not believe in souls so really can not agree with the point categorically. It does however make intuitive sense that the technology in a near future cyberpunk setting would be unable to fully capture all the nuances of the body and thus the mind.
Regarding brain damage, I also find it hard to consider a radically different personality and set of memories within "the same body" (really, far from the same inside skull) to be the same person. Would apply to just growing up from infant to adult as well, admittedly.
Here's a somewhat relevant story about a very unpleasant experience I had today. I worked throughout last night, and took a nap this afternoon, very tired. Woke briefly at some point, feeling like what's probably best described as an NPC on the verge of self awareness. Just aware enough to perceive and be unsettled by my inability to focus on own consciousness, with almost no idea who I am, sense of identity or purpose, memory of what my aspirations in life are, and unable to think in any language other than English (which is not my mother tongue). Hypothetically, if I did not fall asleep soon after, the gnawing feeling of wrongness faded, and I went on with the day… those would not have been my actions.
I saw an article about personality changes following heart transplant and this discussion really helped me understand why that's possible.
I wonder if this topic could branch into online personalities and parasocial relationships. I was recently hearing about Sargon's Twitter being banned and recently unbanned. And people talk about it as if he's died and been resurrected. Kinda funny that people think of it like that. We're at a point where online presence equals existing.
It's surprising that Cyberpunk is nuanced about it, but only because the cyberpunk genre is so bipolar about its themes. "Maybe this brain copying machine isn't that great of an idea" should be the default take, not "the brain copying machine is only bad because a corporation owns it" like in, say, Altered Carbon.